ABSTRACT:
Surface samples of 21 agricultural soils were analyzed by laboratory procedures to predict the size distribution of sediment that would be eroded during rainstorms from interrill areas. The study was conducted to obtain sediment size data for soils of particular interest to erosion/sedimentation researchers and to further evaluate previously developed methodology by using soils with a wide range of properties. Generally, high-silt soils produced the finest sediment. Soils high in clay produced the coarsest aggregated sediment. Problems were encountered in evaluating the size distributions of sediment from soils with primary particles larger than coarse sand. However, the methods used in this study provide a reasonably accurate, simple, and inexpensive means of predicting sediment size distributions for most soils.
Footnotes
F. E. Rhoton is a soil scientist and L. D. Meyer is an agricultural engineer, Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Oxford, Mississippi 38655. This paper is a contribution from USDA-ARS Sedimentation Laboratory, Oxford, Mississippi. The authors thank personnel from the USDA-Soil Conservation Service National Soil Survey Laboratory, Lincoln, Nebraska, for their assistance and various individuals who provided soil samples used in this study.
- Copyright 1987 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society
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